Delegations from the warring sides met for barely an hour and agreed to exchange more prisoners of war - focusing on the youngest and most severely wounded - and return the bodies of 12,000 dead soldiers.

It restated Moscow's demands that Ukraine become a neutral country - ruling out membership of NATO - and that it protect the rights of Russian speakers, make Russian an official language and enact a legal ban on glorification of Nazism. Ukraine rejects the Nazi charge as absurd and denies discriminating against Russian speakers.

Ukraine’s strikes on distant Russian airbases with drones smuggled into the country are believed to have destroyed several of Moscow’s long-range bombers.